A mobile terminal is a portable device capable of audio and video communication, receiving and outputting information, and storing data. As the functionality of the mobile terminal has diversified, mobile terminals have developed sophisticated functions such as a capturing still or moving images (e.g., photographs or videos), reproducing music or video files, supporting games, receiving broadcasts, and communicating data wirelessly, as an all-in-one multimedia player. Various attempts have been made in terms of hardware or software to add more complicated features to the mobile terminal implemented as a multimedia player. One example is a feature for allowing a user to point a camera of the mobile terminal at an object, capture images of the object, and send the images to a remote server for further processing, such as retrieving relevant information about the object. A conventional implementation of such a feature is by the mobile terminal sending images of the object continuously to the remote server, without ceasing, until otherwise instructed by the remote server. Another conventional technology is that the user of the mobile terminal must actually trigger the sending of a request to the remote server by manually pushing a button to capture an image of the object.
The former conventional technology is convenient for the user as compared to the latter, but unfortunately requires the transfer of a large amount of image data to ensure image quality. These transfer cause inefficient use of network resources and burden the remote server. The latter conventional technology reduces the volume of network data transmission and ensures the quality of the images, but adds to the complexity of the operation by requiring manual user interaction.
In order to utilize the mobile terminal more efficiently, it would be effective to adopt computer vision technology into the operation of the mobile terminal such that (a) the only user action necessary is to point the camera of the mobile terminal at an object and to utilize image processing techniques automatically to determine the transition of the mobile terminal from a movement state to a standstill state, (b) to select only the captured image(s) which meet predefined conditions, (c) to send the selected images which meet predefined conditions to the remote server, and (d) to stop sending images automatically when instructed by the remote server.